The 75%

After my great ab workout with Alysia last week, we were walking along the lake, talking about the fitness journey. I told her about the things I was doing right: developing a workout regimen, moving my body every day, eating clean…most of the time…not drinking…most of the time. You know, but it’s a work in progress, right?

I paused for a moment. Oprah stopped by my brain for a second and went Ah-ha! Then continued on to save the world. That’s what I’ve been doing every time I try to get revved up to get back at it. I’ve been giving 75%, thinking that’s enough. And when I don’t get better results, I get frustrated, and go back down to 25%. But I know how this works, I’ve done it before. When I got in the best shape of my life, I was giving 100%. I was working out 5 days per week. I was eating clean 100% of the time. If I did drink, it wasn’t often, and I did squats and burpees for every glass of scotch consumed. And I lost almost all of the unneeded fat, I had energy, I felt great…and we know the rest. But when things fell apart, I went down to 10%. And that’s how the weight crept back on. But THIS TIME, I know how to give 100%, and I know I can do it. And of course it’s not sustainable to give 100%, 100% of the time forever. There have been and will be really tough moments and days. But once I reach my goal, then I enter maintenance mode (more on maintenance once we reach the goal). So really, it just comes down to simple math.

Give 100% – each decision matters – whether or not to go the gym, what foods to eat, whether or not I’m going to use a “fuck it!” and eat the cake. Meditation every day, writing, working through thoughts and feelings to keep myself sane. I keep giving 100% until I reach my goal.

Receive 100% results – healthy mind and body, high functionality in life, more energy to do good work and spend time with great people.

It boils down to those key moments in the day when I have to ask myself, how badly do I want this? Then I can step away from the brownie cookie with vanilla bean ice cream, and straight into the gym.